Land Use and Water Quality in the Hudson RiverAmy GaoGIS in Water ResourcesNovember 16, 2010

Hudson River in New York• New York ranked 18th

among the states in toxic water pollution.

• The Hudson River Watershed ranked 29th out all US waters for receiving the greatest amount of toxic pollution.

• The Hudson River Watershed ranked 2nd in New York State for receiving the most toxic pollution.

Pollution around the Port of Albany,four decades ago

Pollution Sources•River sediments•Metals:

▫Industrial and domestic wastewater discharges

▫Runoff (CSO’s)•Polycyclic Aromatic

Hydrocarbons (PAH)▫Automobile exhaust▫Industrial emissions▫Burning wood,

charcoal and tobacco

NYSDEC Hudson River Estuary Program

Objective

How does land use along the Hudson River affect the metal and PAH concentrations?

Land Use Along Hudson RiverLegendLandUseMergedLANDUSE

Bare exposed rock

Bays and estuaries

Beaches

Commercial and Services

Confined feeding operations

Cropland and pasture

Deciduous forest land

Evergreen forest land

Forested wetland

Herbaceous Rangeland

Industrial

Industrial and commercial complexes

Lakes

Mixed forest land

Mixed urban or built-up land

Nonforested wetland

Null area -- no land use assigned

Orchards, groves, vineyards, nurseries..

Other agricultural land

Other urban or built-up land

Reservoirs

Residential

Sandy areas other than beaches

Shrub-brushland rangeland

Streams and canals

Strip mines, quarries and gravel pits

Transitional areas

Transportation, communications and services

•13.7% is urban, industrial, and commercial land

Lower Hudson River Basin

Geographical and hydrological idea of drainage into the Hudson River

Metals in Hudson River

Arsenic – 30%

Cadmium – 10% Chromium – 3%

Copper – 61% Lead – 43%

Mercury – 72%

Metals Summary

Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Conclusion•Highly urban and industrialized areas

correlate with higher concentrations of metals

•Highly urban and industrialized areas correlate with higher concentrations of PAH

Future Work• Convert land use polygons

into raster data

• Use the “Extract by Mask” Spatial Analysis tool to extract the cells of the land use raster that correspond to the area of the Hudson River Basin

• More accurate correlations between land use and contaminants